John Marshall and Lloyd's Register of Shipping

John Julius Angerstein is regarded as ‘the Father of Lloyd’s’, the bastion of worldwide shipping intelligence. A well-connected banker and underwriter, he was instrumental in founding the modern Lloyd’s during the eighteenth century. John Marshall could equally claim the title of ‘Father of Lloyd’s Register’, as it was he who instigated a committee of inquiry at Lloyd’s that culminated in the merger of the separate Red and Green Books used by shipowners and underwriters to register information about the condition of vessels they insured or chartered. Both the register and the system of ship classification devised by Marshall’s committee of inquiry are still used today. This article examines the events that led to, and the ten-year process which culminated in, the formal unification of the two registers as Lloyd’s Register of British and Foreign Shipping, and how it was that John Marshall, a relatively unknown shipowner from Yorkshire, was able to achieve dominance in the London-based world of shipping.